It is located on the Northwest corner of 1st and Lorena streets in East Los Angeles, with the entrance on 1st Street.

Originally part of Evergreen Cemetery, the oldest cemetery in Los Angeles, the land was donated to the County to be used for burials of unclaimed remains. It has been active since at least 1922, and probably earlier. Unclaimed remains are cremated, stored individually for several years, and then buried in a common grave by year group.

Since the early 1960s, generic square or rectangular markers have been used to identify the common grave for each year. Prior to that time, there were smaller round concrete markers, but for the most part, those have been uprooted or overgrown. Individual markers may be placed by family members, but must conform to specific size requirements.

Records were in the process of being computerized, but the project was stopped prior to completion. All lookups are researched from large handwritten ledgers. If you have a death certificate that indicates the person was sent to the Los Angeles County Crematory, and have the cremation date (usually much later than the date of death), staff will gladly confirm final disposition. In most cases, that will be in which common year grave the cremains were buried, but occasionally they will find that cremains were sent elsewhere for scattering or interment. Visiting the site is allowed, but officially, requests for pictures should be directed to Los Angeles County Public Affairs/Pubic Information.